Giselle is 22, a top medical student and a functioning anorexic. Except now, driven by the pressures of school and her late father’s rejection, Giselle is no longer functioning. Her sister Holly, a 14-year-old track star, can see that Giselle is going to have to confront a few things if she wants to get better. It seems easier for the athletic Holly-she sweats through life’s problems—but now even she feels burdened by the past.

Ibi Kaslik’s vivid novel captures with devastating honesty the story of two sisters struggling to come to terms with their adult selves. Skinny is a sometimes gritty and often wryly funny look at growing up and the hunger for acceptance that drives us all.